The company says it’s doing this to see if to “improve the discoverability of critical privacy and security information.” According to Google, only 11 percent of participants in a recent study knew what the icon meant. Starting with Chrome 93, Google will replace the lock icon in the address bar, which indicates you’re securely connected to a website, with a more “neutral” downward arrow. At first, users will need to turn on the feature, though Google says it may make it the default for everyone down the road.Īhead of Chrome 94, the company has a separate HTTPS-related experiment planned.
When that’s not possible, Chrome will display a warning that you’re putting your privacy and security at risk.
Much like its Firefox counterpart, the tool will attempt to ensure you always connect to a website over HTTPS. With Chrome 94, Google will introduce a feature called HTTPS-First Mode. On Wednesday, Google detailed new features it will introduce in Chrome to further push HTTPS adoption. In April, Google made HTTPS the default in Chrome, but that doesn’t mean the company’s long-standing push to make the protocol as widely used as possible is over.
